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Proceedings of the Third International Congress on Construction History, Cottbus, May 2009 The Platform of the Temple of Venus and Rome C. González-Longo Architect, Edinburgh, UK D. Theodossopoulos University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK ABSTRACT: The Temple of Venus and Rome at the Roman Forum was allegedly designed by the emperor Ha- drian himself and was inaugurated in 135 AD. Its construction upon the Velia hill and precedent structures re- quired an exceptional design and execution, including the provision of a massive 167x 100 m artificial plat- form. Distinct historical developments on the site like the Vestibule of Nero’s Golden House and the later construction of the medieval church and monastery of Santa Maria Nova as well as the Mussolinian operations of Sventramenti in the first half of the 20th century, have influenced the construction and altered the presenta- tion of the platform. This paper intends to discuss the strategy, design, construction and current condition of this example of a lesser-known field of Roman structural technology. Foundations and platforms of this kind can offer invaluable information on the function of a temple, its history and structural performance, but theirs study is often neglected. INTRODUCTION The exceptional complex that includes the Temple of Venus and Rome and the Monastery of Santa Francesca Romana has not been studied previously as a single site and the various stages and interventions in its history have always been viewed with partial reference to specific areas. The authors have tried in the recent years to link such stages to a more global architectural understanding and conservation approach to the entire site. One area that has been identified to contain potentially invaluable information on the development of the site is the substructure, which materialised around the construction of the massive Roman concrete platform, and the interaction with the existing structures. Archaeological and historical evidence will be discussed in terms of architectural analysis that aims to under-stand the development of the platform in classic Roman times and its uses during later occupations. Interpreting the evolution through key drawings and establishing the construction levels at critical sections have been valuable tools that allow for the first time the architecture of this crucial substructure to be discussed. Figure 1: The platform of the temple of Venus and Rome from the Colosseum Proceedings of the Third International Congress on Construction History, May 2009 THE SITE The Velia Hill Looking at the platform of the temple of Venus and Rome as it stands (Fig. 1), it is difficult to understand the original configuration of the area. The Velia is a saddle hill between the Palatine and Esquiline hills. Part of it was removed when Mussolinian opened the Via dell’ Impero (Via dei Fori Imperiali) in 1932. This enormous op- eration, although destroyed very important archaeological remains, allowed De Angelis D’Ossat to investigate the geology of the area (Fig. 2) in which the platform of the temple sits, composed by a thick layer of debris and made-soil above a rock of lithoid tuff on a marsh fluvial formation. The Velia has been occupied since ancient times. Its first occupation was most probably a small fortified set- tlement in the top of the hill (oppidium), one of the communities that celebrated the Septimontium, join other communities to form later the urbis. The hill is also mentioned as the location of the temple of Penatis, the tem- ple of Lares and the house of the Valeriis (Platner; Ashby 1929). The older remains identified so far are a series of structures, mainly to the North of the platform. They include a fine vaulted criptoportico studied during the Mussolinian works (Barosso 1940), perhaps part of Nero’s Domus Transitoria (Fig. 3, coordinates b-c, vi-viii). Figure 2: Geology of the area (after De Angelis D’Ossat 1935) showing the location of the platform Figure 3: Plan of the existing platform and the temple of Venus and Rome on the Velia Hill with indication of the topography, based on (Panella 1985, 1990) and (González-Longo 2004). Proceedings of the Third International Congress on Construction History, May 2009 Figure 4: a) View of the SW corner of the platform b) The foundations of the Arch of Titus to the right The Golden House of Nero After the great fire of 64 A.D. , Nero (reigned 54–68) built his Golden House around an artificial lake located where the Colosseum now sits. The Vestibule was placed on the Velia Hill, under the area in examination. Ac- cording to Suetonius, the Vestibule had a triple, mile long colonnade and contained the colossal statue of Nero impersonated as god Helios in the centre. The statue was 30 meters high, approximately the same height of the existing medieval campanile of the church of Santa Francesca Romana. Van Deman (1923) identified for the first time and established the level of the Via Sacra (the main street of the Roman Forum) at the time of Nero, part of the large urban transformation of this area after the fire. She dem- onstrated (Van Deman 1925) that the street had Porticus (solid arcades added as protection against fire), and that it led to the columnated square of the Vestibule on the Velia. The arcade ran through a mainly residential district originally, which at the time of Vespasian become a truly commercial area around the Horrea Piper- ataria, located in the area that the Basilica of Maxentius occupies today. The Arch of Titus After Nero’s death, the Flavii restructured the area. Titus (reigned 79-81 A.D.) completed the Colosseum, started by his father, Vespasian. After the death of Titus, his brother Domitian built the Arch of Titus on the Via Sacra to commemorate the capture and sack of Jerusalem. The Arch is located next to the platform of the temple (Fig. 4a) and sits on what appears as Neronian concrete foundations, although there is a slight change of orientation, probably due to the intention to make a visual relationship with the newly built Colosseum. The foundations of the arch have now been excavated down to the pre-Neronian level and exposed (Fig. 4b). The Temple of Venus and Rome The Temple of Venere Felix and Roma Aeterna was the biggest temple of Rome and one of the biggest of the Antiquity. It was allegedly designed by the emperor Hadrian (reigned 117-138 A.D.), starting its construction in 121 A.D. (there was already a project since 117 A.D.). He consecrated the still unfinished building on his return from Judea (136-137 A.D.) and it would be completed by his successor Antoninus Pius in 140 A.D. The site on the Velia had important symbolic and urban values for Hadrian, connecting the new and the old part of the city, and establishing an axial relationship with the Capitoline Hill, similar to the one between the temple of the Olympian Zeus (restored by Hadrian) and the Acropolis of Athens. However, the setting and ground conditions between the two temples were quite different. The temple in Athens was located in a large flat area, where the Roman temple was located in a hill with a number of precedent buildings and structures. The temple was a very large building, 113 x 56 m in plan and around 30 m high. It has an extremely interesting design, displaying the unique pattern of two back-to-back cellae, an example of Hadrian’s eclectic architec- ture, which combines Hellenistic proportions and urban presence with Roman spaces and construction tech- niques. In accordance with archaeological excavations (Panella 1985, 1990) and our own survey and study (González Longo; Theodossopoulos 2004), the temple was decastyle (with twenty-two columns at the sides), of Corinthian style, dipteral (two rows of columns in all facades), systyle (columns two diameters apart), and am- phiprostyle (free standing columns in the pronaos). The diameter of the columns is, according with our calcula- tions, 1.74 m (about 6 Roman feet), similar to temple of the Hadrianic Olympeion in Athens. The cella was raised by five steps from the surrounding stylobate. The temple had no podium, unlike the rest of Roman sa- cred architecture, but stands above a crepidoma of seven steps to the stereobate and seven steps from this to the stylobate (Figs. 3, 9). After some damage by fire in 283 A.D., the building was restored by Maxentius (reigned 306-312 A.D.), but it does not appear in use at the time. The decay of the temple started following Gratian’s Decree in 382 A.D. confiscating all properties of pagan cult, and is more severe after the bronze tiles were removed (between 626-629 A.D.) by Pope Honorius I in order to roof the old S. Peter’s. The great earthquake of 847 A.D. probably caused the collapse of the already decaying vaults of the roofless temple and the building slowly became an authentic materials quarry, providing not only stone, but also lime to other sites in Rome (Lorenzatti 1990). The columns were extensively reused in building the new St. Peter and St. John in Lateran. Between 1464-1471, Paul II ordered the removal of the massive peperino and travertine blocks of the foundations in order to be used in the building of Palazzo Venezia. Proceedings of the Third International Congress on Construction History, May 2009 Figure 5: Exposed concrete a) towards South b)with clay towards East c) drains towards Southeast Figure 6: a) Platform to NE b) Platform to North c) Neronian wall to the Via dei Fori Imperiali The Church and Monastery of Santa Maria Nova (Santa Francesca Romana) The first Christian presence in the site could have been between 314-335 A.D., when St.
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